Prince Bharata had everything a boy could want.

He lived in a palace of white stone where fountains sang in the courtyards and peacocks strutted across cool marble floors. Servants brought him sweets stacked like little mountains. Musicians played whenever he wished. His rooms were heaped with toys carved from sandalwood and ivory, and a hundred people said "Yes, my prince" before he had even finished asking.

For a long while, this was enough. Bharata wanted a thing, and the thing appeared, and he was happy — for an afternoon. Then he wanted the next thing.

But Bharata was a thoughtful boy, and one day a question crept into his mind and would not leave. He had watched his old nurse, once strong, now walking bent over a stick, her hands trembling. He had seen his favourite horse grow grey around the muzzle and slow in its step. He had stood quietly at the edge of the room when a beloved court elder breathed his last.

"Everything I love," Bharata thought, "is changing. The sweets are gone the moment I eat them. The toys grow dull. The people I love grow old. Even I, who am young and strong now — one day I too will be the bent old one with the trembling stick."

It was a heavy thought. But strangely, it did not crush him. It freed something in him.

He went to a forest sage who lived simply beside a stream, owning nothing but a deerskin and a clay bowl. "Teacher," Bharata said, "why do you seem happier with nothing than I am with everything?"

The sage smiled. "Because, young one, you have begun to see what I have seen. The body is born, grows old, sickens, and dies — and so does everything it chases. When you stop expecting unchanging happiness from changing things, you stop being yanked about by every craving. You can enjoy the sweet without weeping when it ends. You can love your nurse without breaking when she grows old. That clear seeing — that is not sadness, child. That is the beginning of real wisdom."

Bharata went back to the palace. He still played, still laughed, still ate the sweets. But something inside him no longer grabbed. He held the world now with open hands.